Month: January 2014

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by Juan Zung

In the (almost) beginning, a farmer named Cain killed his brother, a shepherd named Abel. [1] Joseph Campbell says we’ve never been the same since. [2] In short, we kinda used to be communists, but then we kinda all became capitalists.

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By Sam Lam

So who really gets to go to heaven?

During a road trip to Anaheim (not really a road trip, but it took a while in traffic) with a couple of guys from church to the Rock & Worship Roadshow, we had a conversation that veered into being real. And part of it was about blogging and how on a blog, our church blog, or even my own blog, the goal was to be real.

My blog has always been 100. I felt that it’s hard to enough to live in this world being who I am, or trying to be something, and I needed an outlet to be real. And so the conversation led to how sometimes as Christians, we aren’t being real. And sometimes, we try to put up an image that isn’t relatable to someone who doesn’t know who Jesus is. In fact, at many times, our actions of trying to be a holier than thou leads us to make certain people not want to care about Jesus.

Samuel Lam: Samuel is a Bay Area native living in Southern California working in sports media. He blogs on many topics, including sports, music, movies, travel and especially faith. Sam also runs his own personal sports blog on his free time. Check him out at:Green Eggs and Lam & But At The End Of The Day.

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“The most powerful person is the one who is being himself.” – T. M. (An old acquaintance I saw the other day for the first time in several years, completely out of the blue.)

I was recently commended for being someone who doesn’t pretend to be someone I am not. I’d like to think that’s true, especially even if it paints me in a less than perfect light, but I can think of dozens of times I have at least tried out being someone I am not. I must concede, it just doesn’t feel right. Like the one time in high school I tried to walk up to a girl at the mall and simply ask for her number. Couldn’t do it. It just wasn’t me.

I have been through phases in my life where I tried to dress a certain way to please friends or fit a style, but I always eventually come back to being most comfortable in jeans and a sweatshirt. I once tried to dress like an older friend of mine, who liked to wear a baseball cap hooked onto her belt buckle. I know, ridiculous right? And I got a hat that looked like the one she had, but mine had a big “X” on it, but I didn’t know it stood for Malcolm X. People looked at me weird for being a goofy kid walking around wearing that hat, but I just thought it looked cool. But clothes are superficial; they are only a shadow of the real person someone is.

Johnny Cabrera: Pastor Johnny is a Mexican-American guy, married to a Korean woman, with Korexican kids. Loves Jesus. Committed to youth and community engagement. Writes and plays music. Follows sports. Misses acting. Appreciates feedback. He’s also the Youth and Outreach Pastor at Trinity Church. Check out his blog at:catterflystillprocessing.wordpress.com

By John K. Lee

A little over 2 years ago, while laid up in a hospital emergency room in Baldwin Park, I was forced to take a hard look at my life and how I’d ended up there. With needles poking me and monitors beeping all around, I was terrified that I’d leave my then pregnant wife without husband and my unborn son fatherless. While the doctors were explaining to me that I had something called atrial fibrillation, all I could think about was the profound sense of regret I felt because I knew that I was fully responsible for where I’d ended up. I kept thinking: widow wife, bastard son, widow wife, bastard son–ALL MY FAULT!

Obviously, I didn’t need to pay the ferryman to cross the river Styx that night. The doctors were able to stabilize me and after a long night at the hospital, they sent me home. Like most men who just dodged a major bullet, I thanked God profusely (whom at the time I was not really on speaking terms with), made a lot of apologies & promises to my wife, and then pretty much went back to dysfunctional life as usual.

by Juan Zung

In the first biblical creation account, God made us in His image and likeness. I believe this means more than that we look like God, but that we are made to act like God.

“Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” [1]

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By Cindy Cameron

As 2014 rolled around a couple weeks ago, something just didn’t feel like “New Year’s Day” to me. Maybe it was because it was a Wednesday; maybe it was because it was 70+ degrees outside in January. But to try to get into the spirit of the new year, I started to think about some resolutions I could make: to spend more time with God, family and friends, eat less dessert, journal more, exercise consistently, the list could go on…

But honestly, I am not disciplined enough nor do I have unlimited amounts of self-control to accomplish each one of these resolutions throughout 2014. In fact, it’s already the middle of January and I’ve already messed up the exercise and journal resolutions. I’m going to try and keep working at them all, and I hope that my efforts are not in vain, because they are reasonable and doable.

Then I started thinking: Why does a new year have to come in order for me to resolve to make changes in my life for the better?

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by Jeff Cao

I had a bad day recently.

It threw me off my groove so much that I got nothing accomplished that I wanted to accomplish for the day.

I have a deep dislike for days like that. Chances are you do too. But they’re inevitable. You have a conflict with a co-worker, unexpected bad news comes knocking, you get a text or an email that really gets your blood boiling, maybe a crisis takes over the day that you were going to spend to get something significant done (like a project). It happens.

When these things to get to me, I experience a bad day, and not knowing what to do in those circumstances really affected more than just me. I would sometimes say things I regretted, occasionally took my frustrations out on people around me by being really short and cold. It showed up at home too when the atmosphere gets brought down by the scowl on my face.

Funny things about bad days like that, they don’t stay within the day! It’s not all sunshine and daisies the next morning. The consequences of what we do during our bad days runs into the next day, sometimes turning bad days into bad weeks, bad months, so on and so forth.

So how do you handle a bad day so that you can start the next day on a good note?

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But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Galatians 5:22-23

At the a recent Fellowship meeting, Kimberly Lew shared a personal and heartfelt reminder on what it means to cultivate the fruit of the spirit. Her message let us in on her journey and also opened room in each of us to consider what type of “fruit farmer” we’ll be in the coming new year.

Here’s a brief summary of Kimberly’s talk and some thoughtful questions she included at the end. I hope we’ll all contemplate these values, and please, feel free to share your thoughts in the comments section.

Fruit of the Spirit

by Kimberly Lew

I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes so that it will be even more fruitful.

John 15:1-2

Goodness: Growing up, it seemed obvious that I would do the “good” thing or the “right” thing. But it took maturity to know the difference between truly obeying God versus legalism.

Joy: There’s a shallow kind of happiness that we can sometimes find for ourselves, through socializing and doing things we enjoy. But that is not always the same thing as the lasting, inner joy that we get through God.

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I used to call these people “Jesus Scare Freaks” but after talking with one of them, I think it’s an unfair name.

By Samuel Lam

Last year, I attended the Rose Bowl Parade for the first time ever and noticed that there were a lot of people with picketing signs with messages of salvation in Christ. Some were straight to the points, some used megaphones, and some just brought an unnecessary fear to people.

Last week, I returned to the Rose Bowl Parade and I knew that this time, I wanted to talk with them. It was more of me being curious about their approach and why they felt that big signs at a big event was the way to go.

Before the parade began, I sought out one of the picketers. I didn’t get his name, so I will call him Greg. He was an older man, maybe in his 60s and he was very kind and genuine with his discussion with me. He held a sign like the one you see on the right.

I wanted to learn. Instead of just pre-judging them, I wanted to know more.

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